


Thunderstruck

by KaidaShade



Category: Destiny (Video Games)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Drabble Collection, Gen, Origin Story
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-08
Updated: 2020-06-08
Packaged: 2021-03-04 01:47:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,441
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24605665
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KaidaShade/pseuds/KaidaShade
Summary: A few drabbles for my Titan, Testa-27.
Kudos: 5





	1. Origins

The flash of memories is broken and disjointed. Running in the dark, bullets and fear thick in the air, enemies shouting behind. Turning, bellowing a command to comrades, hearing them flee. Battle, pain, the slickness of hydraulic fluid from a shattered joint and the brilliance of a rocket bearing down on her.

Agony.

Darkness.

Light.

She opens her eyes to the sky above her, but it's not the sky she remembers. It's the timeless daytime of overcast grey rather than the jet black of night, and it's silent. For a moment she thinks it's a glitch in her audial units, but then she catches the faint rustle of grass and the chirping of distant birds. 

"I found you! You're awake!" She reacts to the voice and the sudden glowing eye in her face on instinct, with a yell and the hardest flailing backhand she can muster. The… thing, much smaller than she'd first thought, flies off into the grass and she scrambles backwards, scraps of charred, rotted fabric and rusted metal falling away from her smooth plating. Her gear, she realises distantly. Her gaze gets stuck for a moment on the hairline cracks trailing across the surface of her body, circling limbs and crossing her chest, the rocket flashing behind her eyes, but she shoves it away. She has to focus. She tries to get up, but her legs buckle and she lands on her ass. Just like her first time in this body, like a newborn.

Her eyes land on the little white cube, digging itself out of the soft earth where it landed with small twists of its shell. It pops free and hurtles a couple of feet upwards before righting itself and giving itself a shake. It turns to look at her and she meets its eye. It's only got one, doesnt seem to have much else either. "Okay…" it says slowly, "Not the first impression I hoped for, but it's okay, I heard you might be a bit uh, disorientated. I've been looking for you for a really long time, and I'm just… you're here, it's so good to finally meet you! You punch real good!"

She squints at it suspiciously as it drifts slowly closer, then stops and looks off towards the horizon. "Crap. Okay, I'm really sorry, I'll explain everything, I promise, but we have to go. Can you stand?"

She tries, and her legs hold better this time. The cube zips around and plants itself against her back as though it's going to be able to do anything to support her weight, but weirdly it does help a little. She thinks she sees smoke on the horizon, but as soon as she's up the cube darts off in the other direction and she stumbles after it as best she can.   
  
She finds herself in a building she swears she recognises, but she can’t focus long enough to be sure because there're honest-to-god  _ aliens _ in there. She swings at one when it gets in her face and the lightning that crackles down her arm startles her as much as the alien did, but the cube whoops in delight and zips around her. It makes something in her chest thrum, and even though getting through to the little ship is frantic and terrifying and she barely remembers anything her new little friend- her Ghost, he tells her at some point- says, she finds a strange thrill to it. Especially once she gets a gun in her hands and can shoot back at the strange buglike creatures that seem to come out of nowhere at her.

She has to stop, wide-eyed, when she sees the ship. It’s obviously ancient, decrepit, barely functional, but she’s never seen anything like it. The yawning gap of time that she knows nothing about hits her about the same the bullet does.

She feels her legs buckle before she even realises she’s been shot, doesn’t even feel the second one, and there’s a horrible yawning second of pain before a flash of light has her back on her feet, the Ghost calling her to fight back, fight back, while he gets the ship running. She doesn’t have time to question it, grabbing up her gun and firing back with a savage, feral scream. She just got back! How  _ dare _ these things try to kill her?!   
  
She’s still shooting when the roar of engines sound behind her and something flashes and drags her up into the hold, and she nearly sinks a slug into the console before she realises she’s on the ship. Safe. She grabs onto something and sinks to the floor as the ship wheels and blasts off, and it’s several minutes before she comes back to her senses to find the Ghost peering at her.

  
“Okay. We’re going to the Last City. It’s going to be fine, everything can be sorted out there. Sorry you got hurt but… but at least you know now? If you fall, I’ll pick you back up, if you get hurt I’ll heal you. We’re partners now, okay?” She manages a nod. “Do you remember your name?”   
  
That one takes her a bit longer. She closes her eyes for a moment, memories flickering briefly below the surface. Someone shouting in a panic… at her? Yes, must be. “Tes… Testa.” She says, and as she speaks it sounds right, so that must be it. “Testa twenty… four? No, twenty-  _ seven _ . You?”   
“Hmm. Just Ghost right now. But you can call me what you want. We’re going to be spending a lot of time together after all.”    
  
He sounds so damn  _ gleeful _ that she can’t find any energy to be annoyed about it. She can’t smile, hasn’t for a long time, but her eyes glow a little brighter.    
“I’ll think about it. Might not be so bad.”


	2. Wild

There's something in the woods, the children say. Suraya might have dismissed it as fantasy, but she knows what lurks beyond the Farm, the danger that is no game. She asks them what they saw as she has them show her where, prods about numbers of limbs and eyes and strange glows, but nothing quite fits and when she gets there whatever it was is long gone, not even tracks in the leaf litter to give a clue.

She adds a few extra patrols in the area, just in case.

They come to her again, the same children, and say that it was closer this time; a faceless, horned thing that still seemed to be watching them as they kicked a ball back and forth in the sunshine. It doesn't sound like any creature that Suraya knows, but she finds disturbed ground and crushed leaves that suggest something heavy had stood there for a little while.

She decides to guard the football field herself, perched with Lewis on a ledge of a nearby building with her rifle pointed to the trees.

She's glad she does. It's a week before she sees anything, but few here would recognise a Guardian on sight. 

She lurks in the treeline, just visible through the scope with light dappled across scavenged, mismatched armour and a distinctive helm with long, aerofoil horns. Her size and dress suggests Titan, the slightly uncanny way she moves hints at Exo, but her behaviour is bizarre. Strange enough for a Guardian to come here at all, but to skulk at the fringes like this? What is she doing?

Suraya checks her rifle, just in case, but when she looks again through the scope the Titan is gone. She curses to herself, chuckles quietly when her bird tips his head in confusion, then shakes her head and returns to her watch.

It is, heart-stoppingly, the children who lure her out. A football goes flying over the fence to yells of frustration and admonishment of the one who kicked it, and Suraya watches as the kids gather nearby. They know not to go beyond the fence, have it drilled into them from birth almost, but she can see the temptation. She's ready to jump down and go supervise them more directly when they sigh and give up, and she's just gearing up to be proud of them when the ball comes flying out of the trees over their heads and straight into the back of the goal opposite. 

Everyone freezes. Her rifle comes up to scan among the trees as the kids turn back to look. That Guardian again, closer to the fence but not out in the open, statuesque under the children's gaze. She's huge, Suraya thinks, she could kill all of them in an instant if she so chose. Her heart sits in her mouth as she watches one boy take a tentative step forward, stop when the Guardian tenses. She takes aim, just in case. Guardians don't usually hurt civilians, but there is something… off about this one.

She can't hear what the boy says, but she sees him hold out a hand. She sees the Guardian dither for a moment, swaying on her feet slightly, before cautiously approaching and hopping the fence with ease to emerge into the sun. 

The children gather curiously, and one of them takes off running towards Suraya's perch. The Guardian's head tracks her. Though there's no visible visor or eye holes to her helmet, Suraya feels their gazes lock down the scope and she sees her go still, one hand half-raised towards a battered scout rifle on her back. Suraya isn't under any illusions that she would need that gun to hurt the children. She lowers her rifle and waves, and that seems to disarm the Guardian a little. She hesitates, then gives a stilted wave back as though the gesture is unfamiliar to her.

Suraya drops down from the ledge just in time to meet the little girl sent for her, who grabs her hand and excitedly tells her that there's a  _ Guardian  _ and she's so  _ huge _ and that Suraya should come right away, as if she hasn't noticed. The Guardian doesn't take her eyes off her the whole time. Suraya gets the distinct impression of approaching a wild animal, one that might bolt or charge at the slightest provocation. It's not how she has previously felt about Guardians, and it's unsettling.

"Hey." She says, going for casual, "Sorry about that. Easier to see down the scope, you know? What brings you here, Guardian?"

She doesn't reply right away, but her Ghost shimmers into existence and settles gently into her hand as she raises it, and it seems he at least can speak even if his Guardian immediately snatches him close to her chest protectively and takes a step back from Suraya.

_ "We were curious. We've been out here a while and we haven't seen a settlement like this before, outside of the City." _

The Ghost doesn't seem afraid at all, and it almost makes Suraya smile to see him try to wiggle his way free to get closer to her. She directs her words to him, at least for now.

“It’s not much, but it’s home for a lot of us. People trying to get to the City, people who don’t want to go there. We call it the Farm.”   
_ “Is it safe?” _   
“Could be safer. We do our best but, yeah, we’re only human and there’s a lotta Fallen out there. And other things.”

“ _ Do you want a Guardian? Tes is kind of new to it, but she’s very big and very strong and she needs to learn to peop-mmph!” _ The Ghost’s eager offer is cut off by a large Titan finger covering his tiny speaker, and the Guardian shakes her head at Suraya.    
“Ignore him.” She says. Her voice is low and rasping with a metallic, synthesised edge that marks her as definitely an Exo. It sounds like it hasn’t been used in a while.

“New, huh? How new?” Suraya tips her head at her, curious. She never could leave a thread untugged, after all.

“Six months.” 

“Shouldn’t you be training in the City, learning the ropes and what it means to be a Guardian and all that?”   
“No.” The way her shoulders tense suggests this isn’t a line of questioning best followed, but her Ghost manages to wriggle loose and explain.   
_ “She didn’t like it, so we left.”  _ he says, and somehow Suraya can see the exasperation even with the helmet on. The Ghost continues regardless. Suraya is beginning to suspect he’s not particularly smart, but at least he’s friendly.  _ “It’s loud and full of people and rules and that’s a lot for someone who’s been dead for a long time, you know? But there’s plenty of bad guys out here to shoot, so we’ve been teaching ourselves!”  _

That explained the Guardian’s battered appearance, the dirt and leaves in the joints of her armour and the fact that nothing matched and at least parts of it had clearly been kludged together from things stolen from Fallen. She’s gone tense again, and every now and again her head twitches towards the treeline like she’s considering bolting. Suraya suspects that if she does, she’ll never see her again unless she turns up dead and her protective instincts don’t like that.

“Seems like you’ve been doing a good job.” She tries, “It’s dangerous out there, and if you’re both still alive you must be pretty tough. But if you wanna crash here ever, you’d be welcome to come and go as you please.”    
  
It seems to work, at least a little. Some of the tension goes out of her and she glances down at her Ghost before finally releasing him from the cage of her fingers so he can zip over and scan Suraya like he’s been  _ dying _ to do it. She lets him, keeps her hands at her sides, and once he’s done he settles between his Guardian’s horns. “I’ll think about it.” She says finally, giving only the barest of nods so that she doesn’t disturb her Ghost.   
  
It’s good enough, and Suraya steps back and gestures for the few children who haven’t already moved away- they’re not stupid kids, and she’s proud of them for getting some distance when things got tense- to back off. The Guardian seems to understand, and though she does immediately turn back to the trees she doesn’t run. She strides away, her back straight and strong as she disappears. 

  
She never does come and spend a night at the Farm. But Suraya occasionally sees the children waving to something in the trees and patrols around their perimeter report dead Fallen, their bodies lightning-scorched and bullet-riddled, and she suspects the Guardian is fine, somehow.   



End file.
